Was Jesus a Vegetarian? Were the disciples & the Prophets of old vegetarians?

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Shouldn't all Christians today be at least vegetarian, if not vegan, as Dr Kellogg (of the famous line of breakky cereals) persuaded Seventh Day Adventists to become? There is a growing body of evidence & books published arguing that Jesus & his disciples were vegetarian. I'll venture a brief summary. The Garden of Eden, God's perfect world, was vegan (Genesis 1:29-30). Immediately, God calls this ideal & non-exploitative relationship "good" (Genesis 1:31). This is the one time when God makes such a statement. Then follows many years of fallen humanity, when people held slaves, waged wars, ate animals & committed many other violent acts. Although there are passages in the scriptures that appear to endorse eating animals, war, slavery, polygamy, animal sacrifices & other practices most of us would find immoral, these passages are a representation of what existed as a part of fallen humanity, not of God's ideal plan or vision. Despite the fall, the Prophets tell us to expect a new age, a return to Eden, God's Peaceable Kingdom, when even the lion will lie down with the lamb & there will be no bloodshed or violence at all, "for the Earth will be filled with the knowledge of God" (both in Isaiah 11). If Jesus is the new Adam who returns us to the Garden of Eden, as Christians believe, & if he is the Prince of Peace described in Isaiah 11, who ushers in God's new & veg*n vision, it would be inconceivable for him to dine on animal carcasses or endorse this behavior. According to the evidence, there were many faith-based vegetarian Jews in Jesus time (see www.jewishveg.com for more). Jews understood that God's ideal was the veg*n Garden of Eden depicted in Genesis & the Peaceable Kingdom described by the Prophets. Three issues that distinguished the Jewish religious sects that advocated living the veg*n ideal on earth were: baptism in place of animal sacrifices for the forgiveness of sins, opposition to selling animals for slaughter in the temple & celebration of the Passover with unleavened bread instead of lamb. In Jesus time, preaching baptism for forgiveness of sins in place of animal sacrifice placed one clearly among the veg*n sects of Judaism who were attempting to usher in the new age of Isaiah 11. It would not have been lost on anyone in first century Palestine that John, who came to "prepare a way for the Lord", was baptizing people, not sacrificing animals. Isaiah 11, of course, declares that God's will is for compassion, for an age when even the lion lies down with the lamb, & there's no bloodshed at all. For example, Luke explains that "the will of God" is baptism for the forgiveness of sins, "whereas the Pharisees & the teachers of the law, in not letting themselves be baptized, ignored this will of God". Thus, John preached baptism for the forgiveness of sins, Jesus was baptized, & the Gospels & Acts all clearly & consistently advocate baptism. For the Jews who were not vegetarians, animal sacrifice was the way to forgiveness, (& of course, after the sacrifice, the animal was eaten), but for the veg*n Jews, baptism was advocated. Complementing the new focus on baptism, were opposition to the Temple, where the animals were sacrificed, & celebration of the passover without the lamb (slaughtered sacrificially in the Temple). In fact, Jesus rails against the Temple, & his single act of direct confrontation with the authorities is in the Temple, the slaughterhouse of first century Palestine, when he engages in direct action by casting out all those selling animals for sacrifice. We can debate his reasons, but the practical effect was a Jew preventing other Jews from engaging in the Passover slaughter that they felt was called for by God. Clearly, Jesus rejects this idea, claiming twice that they should all learn the meaning of Hosea, when he says, speaking for God, "I desire mercy, not sacrifice". Additionally, there are no scriptures in which Jesus eats lamb, which he'd surely have eaten at Passover, had he not been veg*n. Vegetarian Jews, as one significant aspect of their faith, celebrated a perfectly orthodox vegetarian Passover. We see Jesus eating on the Passover exactly twice & neither time is lamb involved. John places the first multiplication miracle on the Passover, yet the disciples ask Jesus only, "where will we buy enough bread to feed all these people?", giving not even a thought to lamb, which would've been eaten had they not been veg*ns opposed to animal sacrifice. The Last Supper was a Passover meal & was also apparently veg*n. The non-vegetarians ate lamb at the Passover, whereas the veg*ns ate only unleavened bread, as it seems, did Jesus. One last point to make is that many Christians of the first three centuries, including all of the "Desert Fathers", were vegetarians & that they continued, despite being Jewish, to celebrate the Passover with bread & fruit of the vine, not lamb's flesh. It would be very strange for the first Christians to have adopted a diet not followed by Jesus himself. Let's now take a look at the Fish Stories... No, on second thoughts, this argument is long & I'll have to pick it up tomorrow if time allows, maybe starting a separate topic. For now, I'll leave you with a handful of passages that further support a veg*n (this means vegetarian or vegan) diet that you can look up for yourselves. Genesis 1:28-30 Leviticus 19:26 Numbers 11:18-20 Numbers 11:31-34 Deuteronomy 5:17 Exodus 20:13 Psalm 78: 27 & 29-31 Proverbs 12: 10-11 Proverbs 15:17 Proverbs 23:19-20 Isaiah 1: 11-16 Isaiah 7:14-15 Isaiah 11:7 Isaiah 66:2-3 Daniel 1 Zechariah 9:7 Matthew 5:21 Romans 14:21 Romans 12:1-2 1 Corinthians 8:13 I'm happy to explain anything that is unclear to you. Let us know what you think.